She turns, flushing, and for the first time her blue eyes meet the dark ones of the older girl. Her cheeks redden still more, and she whirls about again.
"I can't help it, Uncle Jack," she murmurs. "I'd just like to tell them all what I think of Will's troubles."
"Oh! Candor is to be admired of all things," says Uncle Jack, airily. "Still it is just as well to observe the old adage, 'Be sure you're right,' etc. Now I own to being rather fond of Bill, despite all the worry he has given your mother, and all the bother he has been to me——"
"All the worry that others have given him, you ought to say, Uncle Jack."
"W-e-ll, har-d-ly. It didn't seem to me that the corps, as a rule, thought Billy the victim of persecution."
"They all tell me so, at least," is the indignant outburst.
"Do they, Nan? Well, of course, that settles it. Still, there were a few who reluctantly admitted having other views when I pressed them closely."
"Then they were no friends of Willy's, or mine either!"
"Now, do you know, I thought just the other way? I thought one of them, especially, a very stanch friend of Billy's and yours, too, Nan, but Billy seems to consider advisers in the light of adversaries."
A moment's pause. Then, with cheeks still red, and plucking at the rope netting with nervous fingers, Miss Nan essays a tentative. Her eyes are downcast as she asks,—